After three solid weeks of tweaking, tuning, and trying to set things up the best I could, last night I auditioned for the hardest judge of my musical abilities I know of - my wife. Believe me, after more than a half-century of marriage she has absolutely no qualms whatsoever about telling me if something just doesn't cut it.

I set the keyboard up in the family room, which measures 38 X 28 feet and just a single extension on the Bose L1 Compact tower. I fired up the keyboard, did a half-dozen songs using onboard and third-party style files and the first thing she said was the right hand voices were too harsh, and too loud in comparison with the accompaniment. Of course, she was absolutely right and I made several adjustments to EQ settings, which seemed to solve that problem.

Next, I went to work on the vocal settings. Now, the onboard vocal processor is really great, but the vocal harmony component is not nearly as good as the TC Helicon Harmony-M - no doubt about it. She and I both agree whole-heartedly on that aspect. After some additional tweaking and tuning, I packed everything up and loaded it into the van this morning.

This afternoon I performed at an assisted living and physical rehab center that's just 10 minutes from home. The room measures about 35 X 80 feet and the ceiling height is approximately 12 feet. The walls are papered, the ceiling is a standard, acoustic, drop-ceiling and at one end of the room it's all glass windows floor to ceiling. I set up right in the middle of the room and was surrounded by tables. There was about 60 residents there, who were accompanied by about 8 to 10 staffers, young gals who ranged 25 to 45 years of age. (good looking too!)

To me, the very first song sounded like crap! Yeah, I know, but I was hoping last night's tweaking and tuning would have solved most of the problems - it didn't, but it helped lead me in the right direction.

When I fired up and did the next song I had the EQ section of the keyboard open, and while singing and playing I performed several adjustments on the fly. This went on for about 20 minutes, until I felt really good about what I was hearing.

Next, using VanBasco's MIDI/Karaoke Player and firing it through the Host Connection of the keyboard, I played a midi file and sang with the file. It sounded OK, but not great. Again, I opened the EQ section of the Mixing Console and went to work, which only took a few seconds to get the sound I wanted to hear - the MIDI file sounded incredible. It was smooth, crisp, clear as a bell, and every sound was perfect.

Finally, I saved the settings to an onboard registration and onboard memory bank used expressly for that purpose. The next phase I wanted to work on was my vocals, which were OK, but not as good as I would have liked. This took just two minutes of fiddling with the vocal processor EQs and compression settings - WOW! The ladies, both young and old, raved about the way my voice sounded.

I ended up playing an additional 30 minutes over the allotted time, the facility administrator came in near the end and gave me a thumbs up and as I was leaving he came over and shook my hand and said "I was amazed at how wonderful the music was today - you sounded better than ever." Those are the kind of complements that keep me going, even at my age.

Bottom line, the keyboard is definitely a keeper, I'll still trying to learn my about playing some of the SA voices, which is somewhat of a challenge, but they do offer some interesting aspects to the overall sound.

As for my 3000s, one will be used as a backup, the other will be put up for sale in the next week or so. I will be selling the one that stayed in the office as a backup machine, one that only went on the road one time. And, with it comes a 4-gig USB drive that is loaded with thousands and thousands of style files, custom registrations, custom voices, etc... It's ready to go on the road, fully tuned and tweaked and in pristine condition. It will be in the box, with all manuals, CD, power supply, etc.... It will also be shipped with a spare contact strip, which has been in my office since I purchased my PSR-2000, which uses the same, identical contact strip for its keys. I've never had to replace a contact strip on any of MY keyboards, but I have do this for several friends who pounded on their keys like Jerry Lee Lewis. Before I put it up for sale, I'm going to take it to my service guy and have him give it the once over, just to make sure that everything is in perfect condition.

More to come,

Gary

Great summary, Gary. I have my second job with my new s950 tomorrow and I have done next to nothing so far. I went back and reread your tutorial on EQ settings at JW's site. Tomorrow morning ill check the vocal EQ and try to add a little reverb. I've been away for two weeks and will have do my tweaking after this job. Your posts are not only informational, but educational. Thanks again.

Hi Gary,

So glad it went well for you. I am still in love with mine. It has a presence, a certain brightness to it that people always notice. Sometimes they can't explain exactly what they hear, but they do notice it. And your sax patch is still my go to sax. It has a real warmth and presence that is a perfect match for my voice. And because of my laziness in not wanting to set up ann outboard VH, I have come to terms with the one onboard and I am getting what I consider to be very good results. I heard a lady in the front row today remark, wow, did you hear that harmony? And this was in a nursing home. It's definitely a keeper for me.

Joe

Gary good luck out there the next few months of performing will give you a really good sense of the sounds that you would like with this keyboard as you mp I suggest to performing a small notepad and after each son right right down what you need to do as far a what you need to do as far as editing then you will be able to go to you be able to go to your good luck out there the next few months of performing will give you a really good sense of the sounds that you would like with this keyboard but it has to be done in real time as you perform I suggest to bring a small notepad and after each song right down what you need to do as far as editing you will be able to go to you be able to go to your notes and and create them on the keyboard for example volume levels equalizer settings tempo it will take a little while but eventually after a month or two it will be perfect and you and your audience will simply amaze

Donny, I did a lot of that prior to taking it out on the job, but this Sunday I'll be bringing it back into the office and doing some more fine tuning.

Gary

If you need help call me we can brainstorm or maybe a SKYPE session in real time also with the S950...ok?